


Take a Moment

by KalicoFox



Series: The Adventure Zone Oneshots [2]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Angus is a baby badass, Gen, Lup has a plan, Taako is a badass, Taako wants to let the moon burn, so is Lup
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-13
Updated: 2017-05-13
Packaged: 2018-10-31 06:49:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,429
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10893978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KalicoFox/pseuds/KalicoFox
Summary: Taako takes a moment to breathe before the final showdown. Angus decides to fight.





	Take a Moment

Taako couldn’t think.

He couldn’t breathe.

Lucretia was talking, but her voice was muffled, almost watery.

He couldn’t- this wasn’t-

Something tugged on his arm and he looked down automatically, meeting Angus’ big, brown, worried eyes.

His mouth was moving, but Taako couldn’t hear him any better than he could hear Lucretia.

This was-

There was too much.

Lup. He needed Lup. Lup was gone. _Why was Lup gone?!_

  
He couldn’t do this now. He had to pull himself together. The Hunger was here, they _had_ to deal with that.

He just-

he just needed a minute. Just a minute, to catch his breath. To make his mind stop fucking running in goddamn circles.

He meant to say ‘I’m fine.’ and smile at Angus, just to get that worried look off of his face.

What came out instead was a spell. A series of unfamiliar words, tripping off of his tongue in an almost frenzied haste.

He didn’t _(did)_ know the spell. Time Stop. Impossible for a twelfth level wizard to cast, but, well. He wasn’t exactly _only_ level twelve now, was he?

Angus froze. Lucretia froze. The whole damn world outside of himself froze.

And Taako broke away from the stiff, unresisting grip on his sleeve and bolted.

 _Not too far,_ something murmured to him, but he had to get away from the Director (could he even call her Lucretia anymore? Did she deserve it?) and Merle and Magnus.

He had to get away from Angus.

_'I’m here.’_

  
He didn’t stop running until he fetched up against a wall, barely before the limit that would have had the spell breaking.

Taako wanted-

He didn’t know.

The Taako who didn’t remember? He would have laughed it off, right? Stuffed the memories down into the little box in the back of his head that kept Sazed and Glamor Springs and everything else from breaking his chill. So he had a twin. So what? _Had_ was the operative word there, bubeleh.

The Taako who _did_ remember, remembered clinging to Lup as the only stability in a world where nothing was stable. She’d been there for him for his entire life. How _dare_ that scribbling bitch make him forget!?

The Taako who remembered wanted nothing more than to burn this whole damn fake moon to the ground. _Fuck_ the others, Lup was dead.

The only thing that held him back was the tiny, tenuous hope that The Starblaster was around somewhere and he’d be able to get her back once they left this planar system.

He didn’t even realize that he’d slid down the wall to huddle against it until his (Lup’s, of course it was Lup’s, she’d always had a thing for unusual wands) umbrastaff fell over with a clatter.

_'I said I’m fucking here, dipshit.’_

  
Taako blinked. Glanced around the hallway, then blinked again.

Time Stop was still running. He hadn’t broken it, and no one else could, so who-?

 _'Who the fuck do you think, jerkass?’_ the umbrella twitched, flipping a little bit so that the tip was aimed more or less at him.

“Lup?” His voice was rough, almost as hoarse as if he’d been screaming, but he didn’t remember making a sound since he’d rattled off the spell.

_'Fucking finally! Baby bro, you have no idea how boring it’s been, sitting around in this goddamn umbrella.’_

  
“Hey, fuck you, I’m the oldest!” Taako snapped automatically, sitting bolt upright and fixing the umbrastaff with a glare.

It didn’t move, but Taako got the distinct impression of rolling eyes. _'Three minutes doesn’t make you the oldest. And besides, I never forgot my entire life. That means that subjectively, I’m older than you.’_

  
Taako’s mouth flapped for a moment as he tried to come up with a way to dispute that. “It’s not like I forgot on purpose!” he squawked, “Lucretia-”

 _'Yeah, I know. I’ve been here basically the whole time, remember?_ ’ the umbrastaff shifted a little, and Taako’s mouth clicked shut. _'Your spell’s gonna run out soon.’_

  
“So?”

_'So I’ve got the most baller idea on the face of the moon.’_

  
One eyebrow arched. “Oh?”

  
——

  
When whatever spell Mr Taaco had cast broke, he was gone.

Panicked, Angus turned toward the Director, who was staring at her door with the saddest look Angus had ever seen.

“Let him go.” She said quietly, and turned toward Merle and Davenport and the stranger that Merle had snuck onto the moon. The four quickly sketched out a rough plan of what they could do, and how they were going to do it, then Davenport and Merle bolted out the door to aid Magnus, while the strange darted back down the hallway to the Director’s private study.

The Director herself turned to look at Angus and the few guards who had remained, waiting for orders.

“I’m going to make this quick.” she said resignedly, “These creatures are not, per se, living, but they are incredibly dangerous. They are part of a larger creature that devours entire planes. No one will think differently of you if you choose not to fight, but there is no where that is safe.”

For a moment, she paused, her eyes lingering on Angus, then her grip on her White Oak staff tightened and she strode for the door.

The message was clear. She wasn’t going to order anyone to fight, but neither would she order them not to.

Angus fell in behind her, his wand clutched tightly in one white-knuckled fist.  
Outside the dome was carnage. Everywhere Angus looked, people were fighting and dying, and he almost froze, horrified by the sheer magnitude of the fight. This was nothing like any of the murders he’d investigated before.  
Then, out of the corner of his eye, he saw something small and black, flecked with swirls of bright colours, leaping at someone’s unprotected back and he whirled, shouting the words of the first spell that popped into his head.

The fireball that blossomed out of the end of his wand blasted the creature backwards, then hit the ground and exploded, and suddenly Angus was caught up in the flow of battle, doing his best to duck and dodge out of the way of the attackers as magic poured from his lips and his wand.

All too quickly though, he was exhausted, panting and clutching at his wand with fingers gone numb spells and spells ago. This was it. He was out of spell slots, and he’d somehow ended up out in the open, with nothing to keep him out of sight of the creatures.

Something leapt for him, and Angus braced himself, forcing himself to keep his eyes open, even though part of him wanted to clench them shut and curl into the smallest ball he could.

Warmth wrapped around him, plucking the wand from his fingers and swooping him around in a circle. Black still filled his vision, but this was a different black. Warm and soft rather than cold and empty. Pure black, rather than flecked and worked through with icy colors that made him think of oil.

An umbrella swung in one hand, directing sheets of fire to one side as Angus’ wand twirled expertly in the other, sending concussive blasts of sound interspersed with enormous chunks of ice out amongst the invading creatures.

“Mr. Taaco?”

Taako glanced over his shoulder, directing a cheerful wink at Angus.

“Hey there Ango, how’s it hanging?”

“But you _left_!”

Taako frowned, backing up a few paces so that he could slide around to stand behind Angus, guarding his back from anything that might take advantage of the boy’s unarmed state.

“That was…” he paused, powering up the biggest fireball he could at the tip of the umbrastaff before letting it fly into a group of Hunger Creatures that looked like they were getting a little too organized. “There was a thing I had to take care of. You didn’t think I was gonna let Merle and Magnus have a chance at all the fun, did you?”

Something about his voice was different, Angus thought, but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was.

“Ango, I know I’m a badass, but this is actually harder than it looks.” Taako’s voice was tense. “I’m gonna need you to keep your trap shut until we’ve got this shit done with.”

“Yes sir!” Angus said, and promptly clamped his mouth shut.

Mr. Taaco implied that there would be an afterwards.

He could wait until then to ask about two handed casting.

And about the slight changes in his voice on some of the spells.


End file.
